Category Archives: Afghanistan

Newly leaked government documents have provided an unprecedented window into the secret U.S. drone assassination program across the globe. In “The Drone Papers,” The Intercept reveals drone strikes have resulted from unreliable intelligence, stemming in large part from electronic communications data, or “signals intelligence,” that officials acknowledge is insufficient. The documents also undermine government claims that the drone strikes have been precise. In Afghanistan, strikes on 35 direct targets killed at least 219 other people. Among other revelations, they also suggest the strikes have hurt intelligence gathering and that unknown male victims have been labeled as “enemies killed in action” unless evidence later proves otherwise….

continue reading, including interview with Jeremy Scahill and links, at Democracy Now!

Only a few months ago President Obama announced the good news that our combat role in Afghanistan – the longest war in American history – would finally end by January 1.

But put away the champagne, for a flock of screeching war hawks brought heavy political pressure on Obama to reverse himself. So our troops will stay in that war-ravaged, corrupt, bankrupted, ethnically-divided country for at least another year or two. Amazingly, the hawks’ argument was that Obama should not rush the timeline for training Afghan security forces to defend their own country.

Rush? Hello: IT’S BEEN 13 YEARS! “Operation Enduring Freedom,” as this mess of a military mission was named, should be renamed “Operation Endless War.” …

In a bold new proposal to break the deadlocks in Afghanistan and Iraq, Senator John McCain (R-AZ) proposed that the United States invade and occupy those countries.

“Those governments are engaged in antagonistic behavior not only toward the United States but also toward their own citizens,” McCain said. “They are dividing their people through unacceptable partisan strife that sets factions against each other with no regard for their national welfare. They are even holding talks with those who oppose them.”

“Presidents Maliki and Karzai have been acting as if he wants to ruin their economies, demoralize citizens, and turn their countries over to our enemies,” the 2008 presidential candidate added. “For the sake of the Afghan and Iraqi people, we need to send a substantial military force, chase out those unworthy leaders, and install friendly regimes. We must show the people of the Middle East how we in our country maintain a responsive government that fully and openly responds to the needs of the people.”

“Our national interest and ultimately our access to our oil in the Middle East are at stake,” stated McCain’s long-time ally Senator Lindsay Graham (R-SC). “Karzai absolutely refused to do as we said when John and I talked with him last month, and Maliki is just as bad.”

“Let’s see about sending some troops to straighten out Libya, Egypt, Syria and Iran while we’re at it,” Graham added. “If our ships and planes are carrying troops and materiel that way anyhow,” he explained, “It will be cheaper to just take over all those trouble-makers at the same time and stay the course.”

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates concurred. “The Afghans, Iraqis, and their neighbors will welcome us with open arms,” he said while on a tour to promote his recent book. “It will be a cakewalk.”

WASHINGTON—As they scoured the Internet for more juicy details about former CIA director David Petraeus’ affair with biographer Paula Broadwell, Americans were reportedly horrified today upon learning that a protracted, bloody war involving U.S. forces is currently raging in the nation of Afghanistan. “Oh my God, this is terrible,” Allie Lipscomb, 29, said after accidentally stumbling on an article about the war while she tried to ascertain details about what specific sexual acts Petraeus and Broadwell might have engaged in. “According to this, 2,000 American troops have died, 18,000 have been wounded, and more than 20,000 civilians have been killed. Jesus Christ. And it’s been happening for, like, 11 years.” …

Equality Fraternity Reality

Strong children

"It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken ones" —Frederick Douglass

Ignorance and Power

“Ignorance allied with power is the most ferocious enemy justice can have.” -- James Baldwin

Money is power….

"Money is power. In Congress, in state legislatures, in city councils, in the courts, in the political conventions, in the press, in the pulpit, in the circles of the educated and the talented, its influence is growing greater and greater. Excessive wealth in the hands of the few means extreme poverty, ignorance, vice, and wretchedness as the lot of the many.”
— Rutherford B. Hayes, President of the United States 1877-1881

Let the people think….

Let the people think they govern, and they will be governed.”
-- William Penn, Some Fruits of Solitude, 1693

Taxes & budgets

Women's rights

Dehumanization

"The propagandist's purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human" - Aldous Huxley

Money is power

Money is power. In Congress, in state legislatures, in city councils, in the courts, in the political conventions, in the press, in the pulpit, in the circles of the educated and the talented, its influence is growing greater and greater. Excessive wealth in the hands of the few means extreme poverty, ignorance, vice, and wretchedness as the lot of the many.”
-- Rutherford B. Hayes, President of the United States (1877-1881)

Riots

“Riots are the language of the unheard” -- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Cost of War

Currently nearing $1.6 trillion, for Iraq and Afghanistan alone; watch it grow at Cost of War

The cause of war

"The cause of war is the preparation of war." -- W.E.B. DuBois

Presidential limits

"The president does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation."

--Barack Obama, 2007

Totalitarianism

“To be corrupted by totalitarianism, one does not have to live in a totalitarian country.”

-- George Orwell

Reimagining capitalism

"Politicians argue over big government so they can avoid talking about big capitalism" -- William Greider in The Nation

The problem with democracy

Progressive calendar

Click hereto view calendar of progressive events in and near Chester County.Agenda view (click in upper right of calendar) may be best.

Links to other sites:

Let the people think …

"Let the people think they govern, and they will be governed."
--William Penn, Some Fruits of Solitude, 1693

On humor

"When oppressed peoples have no other remedy they resort to humor" --E. O. Wilson

Koch Brothers index

For a list of all posts relevant to the Koch Brothers on this site, click here.

Truth and consequences

"If one tells the truth, one is sure, sooner or later, to be found out." -- Oscar Wilde

Power

“Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.”

-- Frederick Douglass, 1817-95

Schools, parents, democracy

“What the best and wisest parent wants for his child, that must we want for all the children of the community. Anything less is unlovely, and left unchecked, destroys our democracy.” -- John Dewey

Search

Liberty v. power

“The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves.”
-- William Hazlitt, 1778-1830

On war

"No matter what political reasons are given for war, the underlying reason is always economic." - A. J. P. Taylor

Bill Moyers says

"The opposite of poverty is not wealth; it is justice."

Ain’t they got no shame

In the name of peace
They waged the wars
Ain't they got no shame

-- Nikki Giovanni

Need & Greed

"Earth provides enough to satisfy every man's need but not for every man's greed" -- Gandhi

Normalcy?

"If this is normalcy, I'd hate to see what real trouble is" - the late Daniel Shore on Iraq, Morning Edition, NPR, 3/29/08

Freedom and tyranny

"...So long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom,
those who wish to tyrannize will do so; for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise, to put shackles upon sleeping men." --Voltaire, 1764

Thoughts on War

"Every war, when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac." -- George Orwell

"You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you." -- Leon Trotsky

Total Cost of War

The cost of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars to Pennsylvanians alone is over $57,000,000,000 and to the entire US is over $1.3 trillion; now wouldn't that be helpful in Harrisburg and DC these days? Track our dollars' alarming and destructive disappearance at CostofWar.com

The American oligarchy

“The American oligarchy spares no pains in promoting the belief that it does not exist, but the success of its disappearing act depends on equally strenuous efforts on the part of an American public anxious to believe in egalitarian fictions and unwilling to see what is hidden in plain sight.” — Michael Lind, To Have and to Have Not